How cold are we, really?

Ha! I just hit enter and entered my title all alone again for the first time in months I do believe.

My mind was elsewhere I suspect. This severe cold that has attacked the world is something to be reckoned with, and I imagine will too be blamed on global warming once again, a hole in the ozone layer causing all these record breaking temperatures!

Did you know that it was flurrying and sleeting in Orlando today?
And that us, three hours further south Floridians are looking to tonight to go down into the twenties?
What the heck is going on?
And here I really thought that the end of mankind and woman kind was going to be by burning up from the sun getting too much exposure from that notorious hole, not that we would freeze to death!

Earlier on IM I spoke to our old neighbor in Jersey and they too are in the twenties right now, but dropping to the teens tonight. Yesterday, I checked on my order of black sweat pants from Hanes, and the operator was in North Carolina and they had temperatures in the teens yesterday; in the Carolinas!

Well, Hubby did all he could on protecting our crops again, fruits as well as veggies.

Today was the type of day that just begged for homemade soup and so I made some corn chowder, since my two week diet does not allow raw veggies or even shellfish! Dinner was pot roast ala pressure cooker, adding humidity to our overly heated very dry home.

The email wires too were busy with electronic communications from hither and yon, proving to me that nearly all of my family and friends peeps were staying logically within their dwellings; how apropos!

My sign of welcome was hung today in our foyer over the door across from our entry, but tomorrow it will come down to get an additional border of trim to give it, in my mind, a more finished look. We found leftover trim/edging from another project and it appears to be just the right size.

Indoor projects, games, movies, what-have-you are a great way to beat the winter blahs; this is crazy to even say that here in the Sunshine State!
We should be wearing flip flops and bathing suits, boating, fishing, swimming and shelling; this is sooooooooooo wrong!
Why oh mighty powerful one why oh why….Al Gore, tell me why?
Snowing in Europe for the first time in thirty years, the coldest we have been in Florida for the first time in over twenty! Craaaa zeeee!

My heat is set high and is electric; we cannot take the cold anymore, no more blood in our veins, please we need some sunshine, did I mention that it was raining again today in our dry season? So sad and dull were the skies I had to put on a light to see inside! This is so wrong my friends, you betcha!

Good night to all and to all stay warm, and count those blessings and we will too!

He's back... a little crafty, and a few things to straighten out,OK?

First of all for the evening I would very much like to straighten out the people that keep sending me spam emails about training for jobs, and financial aid. We need neither; our income is sufficient, and our home bills are paid monthly on time or early, thank you very much, including our mortgage! The only problem I have is receiving medical insurance and that is NOT because we cannot afford the premiums, I would love to pay some, really! It is because I am pre-existing and no one will cover me! Hubby is insured. It is true we are on a set income, but it is enough for our financial needs, and we are not considered poor by any standards! So people who send those things for me to work and get training, and to save our home… I don’t need to get a job unless I want to buy ridiculous things, and our home is fine and paid for monthly like everyone else’s with a mortgage or even you renters, thank you very much! So STOP now!

Besides I no longer drive due to my medications causing me to get dizzy, and I feel that is a benefit to all on the roads, and I did work for thirty-two years while raising our sons; I paid my dues. The only job I would accept is for this Blog to be turned into a book, or any other writing position. But remember I do on occasion write for the paper, for free, and I have been published in a book, also for free. But payment in the writing field that I could do from here at my home I may consider if they were any legitimate offers that can be checked out appropriately.

The he’s back reference is to our Great Blue Heron, and would you believe he was standing in the middle of our pond! He was on the netting fortunately, and apparently could not get at the fish, thankfully!

Now to my craftiness…another sign, another bunch of “E’s used”, it is an indoor welcome sign stating, “HOPE LIVES WELCOME TO” our real names home.

Oh you mean to tell me you didn’t know that Tobi and Hubby weren’t our real names? LOL

The HOPE is written as the artist Robert Indiana would do, who is quite famous by his body of work: copy and paste his sites to see more info: http://www.farnsworthmuseum.org/exhibition/robert-indiana-and-star-hope
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Indiana

Stay warm peeps!

Good night to all and to all count those blessings and we will too!


PS To anyone who was wondering about Hubby’s easy chair, I am proud to say it has healed! Thanks to an additional dabbing the remaining slight red wine stains with white vinegar and using the wet/dry vac again to pull the dampness out!

Ooops... one doctor too many!

Today I had my tummy doc appointment, and he feels I need to have an endoscopies’ procedure since I could possibly have a blockage in my esophagus due to my vomiting. He also said that since my last colonoscopy was way back in 2001 and I had a few polyps then that were removed that I should have another one of those too. And he is willing to work with me at the Medicare price for the two procedures at only two thousand dollars!
What to do, what to do, we can’t afford another large expenditure now, but if I wait can I afford to?
In the meantime he said try to stop eating roughage, in other words raw veggies and fruits, darn…my favs!
And to take the purple pill boxed stomach medicine, but it takes a while to kick in, unlike my chewy complete ones!

This has not been a too feeling good day.
My muscle spasms have gone berserk attacking in most all of my lacking true muscular body, and I consumed a few of my antispasmodic medication pills today for the first time in quite some-time. I think it is mostly caused by the contrast in the temperatures that we had to deal with today!

It is usually difficult sitting in this upright position to write due to my hips, but right now it is a wee bit more, since my tummy is still not so good although I did take that purple pill around four hours ago!
So I might very well be calling it a night sooner rather than later…

Yep, I think I will bid you all a good night now so I can retreat to my lounge chair which is easier on my hips and belly issues.

Count your blessings and we will too!

Resolutions in a different way...

I am more than sure that everyone out there does know that resolutions are also ways to solve problems, not just a promise to oneself to be better at this or that on the New Year, right?
That’s what my tonight’s chosen title is actually about.

We all know how hard I have been trying to get my medical issues resolved, true?
Now with not trying to be too redundant in my explanations I will tell you what has recently transpired as of today.
I returned to my new ophthalmologist office, and have resolved the concern over how to pay for my cataract surgery, which was also today resolved and scheduled for next Tuesday!
It seems that there is relief for us of the falling between the cracks peeps, which means lost within the health care system, a company called Care Credit gives people who are approved; interest free loans for a certain term of months and amounts. So I was accepted for a 24 month payment plan at just $78 to pay off the $1877 left eye surgery that will now be lovingly called my reading eye, since I have decided on the mono vision lens that is within our budget. Actually, we were approved for more than twice that, but I worry for any upcoming possibilities. I call it wiggle room.
My right eye, although bad according to the doc I can still see out of it for distance with my glasses just fine, but lefty is a goner forever; or at least until next Tuesday!

Then after that was arranged we stopped at the giant discount store, for odds and ends.
And finally home where I received my other phone call of resolve.
You see, I have a long history of stomach disorders, going back into my twenties actually, and I took a chance this morning and I called my old Gastroenterologist to see if perhaps he would be willing to wheel and deal on his office visit prices, which I had no idea what they were without insurance since I had not gone to him since I was uninsured; the last three and a half years.
And guess what his wonderful nurse called me back and said that he was willing to see me for less than the monthly charge on my eye surgery, and so I am scheduled for tomorrow late morning!

See there is more than one way to get your resolutions resolved, huh?

On that confusing note I will bid you all a very good night and to all count those blessings and I will too!

The threat is still on...

Ours is only the continued threat of freezing for four more nights, which so far here in south west Florida somehow we have been able to escape thankfully!

In spite of the inclement weather; too cold to believe, only highs in the low fifties!
We did manage to take care of business, and we accomplished all errands set for today’s schedule.

The warehouse store was a major choice for the day’s journey for water at 32 bottles for just $4.48 in the thinner recyclable material that even if it doesn’t go where they say it will it will still decompose, and so we bought two of those, and gasoline for our car to fill up. Which is usually cheaper by five to ten cents a gallon less than the other road shops, but it was just our luck by our late morning arrival it had just gone up by five cents a gallon! Although the other stations probably too went up, but for some reason on our way home I forgot to check.

Then on to the home store for house plants and potting soil, yeah!
We did find a bunch of my all time enduring favorites, dracaena, schefflera, ivy, a couple of succulents, and a Boston fern filled out the home pots waiting for them, very pretty and oh what oxygenation! They are currently all planted and scattered here and there according to their light needs. Hubby even gave me a spare sprayer to use as a mister for the Boston, and I painted the recycled bottle with my acrylic non toxic paint in a very pretty apple green.

We also stopped first thing to pick up some wine at our discount liquor store.
And tonight my co-ordination was way off again as I put my red wine Lucite glass on the coaster between our two easy chairs I looked over to admire the new look I made to the foyer table with my wooden Toucan, ceramic butterfly, and bee candle holders with a colorful mini print in the center I knocked over my glass and sprayed the entire, well not the entire, but most of the glass of RED WINE at my Hubby’s matching easy chair that's in off white ribbed cotton , and I screamed and went to work with a bottle of club soda and upholstery cleaner, and Hubby went to the garage for his wet dry shop vac. Together, we did the best we could, several times, and all we have to do now is pray that it is all gone.
Hubby is resting his derriere on white towels over the damp remainder of our cleaning efforts. I hope it will heal.

Foolishly, I have attempted another glass of red wine while I write tonight, but it is in the sunroom on the very wide top of this desk on a coaster, oh darn, yes I have spilled things on this too including this keyboard, but I promise I will try to be more careful!
And this Cabernet is so good, really!

With that true confession I will bid you all a very good night, and to all count those blessings and I will too!

Heron country once again! And the fickle pickle was at it again!

Where do Great Blue Heron’s eat?
Anywhere they want to………..but here!
Fortunately, our netting, but not our cheesy pink plastic flamingoes saved our remaining fishies! That thing about heron’s being territorial I suppose does not have anything to do with fighting pink plastic flamingoes for their property or eateries, dinning facilities… you get the picture.
He has been here at least three times today, which is the first time in ages that we have seen him. Many fish have probably found warmer waters, and so he may very well be desperate.

Our cold snap is still snapping away, although tonight is the first night that doesn’t threaten to freeze, but tomorrow night may. It’s so nice to be at least prepared for the worst. I know, in reality who wants anything in life to be the worst? We sure don’t.

But as possibilities go, cold weather being colder, is not as bad as many other things that run through this hyper active brain stormer of mine. I have so much imagination I could put an imagineer (Disney guy) out of business! But my ideas are either way off track and many are not even close probabilities.
Some are dream based others may be some irrational fears, and others are just creative justifications, none are ever drug induced unless cholesterol or blood pressure meds cause hallucinations? Mind creations or ideas can be fascinating when they are not at all boring, and most of mine are not, boring that is.

Did I tell you I started my own greeting card business again, well not really a business, just manufacturing cards for family and friends no income involved, darn, the hard copy type (I still had a lot of card stock and envelopes left from years ago, ergo the cards don’t cost me anything and yet I search my clip art for PICS, and my logo is two feet! I know I call it: ‘Put my two feet in’, publishing, get it, a nosey-body sticking your two feet in; like putting your two cents in the personal business of people?) I send the cards out snail mail. I do know that the US Post Office is dying a slow death; we all, shop and pay our bills online. So I feel like I am doing a major service giving the guys and gals called postal workers something to deliver! And I still have quite a few forever stamps left… so why not?
And because of them I have no idea how much it is to mail a regular card these days, do you?

Since I mentioned my card publishing I thought I better tell on myself…remember how cold I thought my cousin was sending me notification of my uncle’s death by email, and so I felt an email note was a proper way to respond…I sort of decided I would send a hard copy of a more appropriate sympathy card and so I made one and sent it out today.
Of course mine are so much more personal than the store bought ones, but this time I was more sympathetic and tried to make him feel that he did all he could for his dad, which is true. He moved his dad nearby him when he felt that his dad wasn’t doing so well so far away, and I told him so. Any-who, who knows what will come of our relationship.
Right now it is fifty-fifty that it could go either way, only time will tell.

Well, on that revelation I will bid you all a good night and to all count those blessings and we will too!

Brrrrrrrr....cold enough for you?

Tonight I do mean the temperatures and they are a falling once again!
I told you I thought that we in the southland had laws against this sort of thing!
But noooooooooooooo here we go again, almost as if we were jealous of you northerners and your cold stuff, i.e. your air temps; but not me by any means. I much prefer our warmth, twelve months a year, thank you very much!

To our good we never did make it down to freezing although we were prepared, as warned. Tonight and tomorrow night are supposed to be just as threatening, where am I? Did I fall back into New Jersey during a horrible weather freeze dream/nightmare?
Nothing personal New Jersians, but that is one of the major reasons we left twenty-three and a half years ago, too cold winters, causing severe hibernation modes, aching backs from shoveling out, and nearly frostbite in places we no longer have to worry about, since here we can expose all extremities whenever we care to, due to our usual warmth.

I must say the heat is getting a work out, which I cannot remember needing to use for this length of time in years, no make that never! Our daytime highs were in the mid-fifties today, another unheard of weirdo experience. According to the Weather Channel reports for the balance of this week… it’s a total non ‘come on down’, commercial for our highs will only reach up into the mid-sixties towards the end of the week and then plummet once again to the mid-fifties!

Hubby even drained the solar panels on our roof, and closed down all outdoor valves!
Charlie, our 30 year old Cockatiel has now been moved into our dinning area out of our sunroom, which has turned out to be the coolest at night, would you believe the sunroom?

During the day it does do a great job of spreading it’s warmth throughout our space, which is like a great room that encompasses our living room dinning and kitchen without walls and the sunroom is off the kitchen. Do you have a mental picture of the set up?
Our bedrooms are off the hallway to the left of the space with one bath, and the other bath is off the sunroom, the laundry-room is off the foyer, and has a door into the garage;all very nicely stream-lined for easy access.

We did venture out to the park in River City, AKA Punta Gorda, translation Fat Point, there was a car, truck, motorcycle show there today, along the Peace River but it was way too cold to stay, but we did manage to go once around the displays.

On that note I will wish all a good night and to all count those blessings and we will too!